


Parallel

by TrekFaerie



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman (Movies - Nolan), DCU
Genre: Age Difference, Dimension Travel, Dubious Consent, M/M, Multiple Personalities, Multiple Universe, Self-cest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-06
Updated: 2013-03-06
Packaged: 2017-12-04 10:50:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/709929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrekFaerie/pseuds/TrekFaerie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is one Jonathan Crane out there in the great multiverse that's completely unique, and for one reason: he's ridiculously pretty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Parallel

“So, you’re actually...?”

“Yes, you. From another reality.”

Crane didn’t understand what sort of Gotham this boy (Jonathan, he mentally called him, for having two people with the same name was confusing enough, and the kid looked more like a Jonathan than he did a Crane.) came from where alternate realities weren’t a reasonable explanation for everything. He had met lots of versions of himself, personally: Good ones, bad ones, ones that weren’t much of anything at all, but they had all held one thing in common. The common trait of Jonathan Cranes across the multiverse was a face not even mothers could love.

And then Jonathan happened.

Even Crane, who admittedly hadn’t cared about such things for decades, had to admit that the boy (and he was definitely a boy, not a man, though few weren’t in Crane’s eyes) was ridiculously beautiful. He had soft, feminine features and bright blue eyes, and when he sat on Crane’s desk for lack of anywhere better to sit, his legs crossed at the ankles. Crane stared at him and wondered how much easier his life would have been, if he’d only been lucky enough to be born looking like that. The kid probably didn’t even realize...

“Is this what my future is going to be like?” Jonathan looked around the apartment distastefully; Crane hadn’t known that he would be receiving interdimensional visitors, and thus had neglected to tidy up. “I can’t say I’m excited for it.”

“No, it might not be. Your past is completely different from mine; your future may be, as well. In reality, we look to be entirely unrelated, except for the name. And profession, of course.”

He sighed, rolling those beautiful blue eyes. He uncrossed his legs, then crossed them again, hands folded primly in his lap. Crane, who had been standing on the other side of the room in his initial fear of causing a tear in reality with their contact, found himself by the table, arms initially wrapped around his chest. He definitely didn’t know...

“Sir? What do you think you’re doing?”

His hand was cupping Jonathan’s face, his thumb at the corner of his mouth. The temptation to run it over his lips was maddening, and he gave into it. “Did you have a good relationship with your parents?” he asked absently, eyes focused on the lips.

“Are you seriously trying to psychoanalyze me? We must be the same person, then.”

“Just answer the question, boy.”

Jonathan shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant, but his face had turned a light pink, and his breathing was irregular. “My father died when I was young. My mother doted on me.”

There were worlds of implications behind those words, directions Crane’s mind could take and did... “And you never had any siblings, did you? Your mother never had a daughter.”

The pink turned crimson, and Jonathan grabbed at his wrist, the beginnings of fury darkening his eyes. “Let go of me. Now.”

Much to his obvious surprise, those words had the opposite effect. The hand on his face moved to his shoulder, and Crane pushed him back onto the table so hard his head bounced against it with a loud thunk. The force sent his glasses to the very edge of his nose. “You had better let me go,” he said, his tone surprisingly calm for the situation. “I’ll scream.”

“Oh, I bet you will. Not that it will do anything to help you; this place has been condemned for years. Not a soul will hear you.” Jonathan was dressed extremely well, his suit and tie impeccably pressed, yet another contrast with the disheveled man above him. Crane purposefully tore the expensive fabric as he ripped the suit open, and managed to pop off more than a few of the buttons on the shirt. Though the boy kept his face schooled to indifference, his eyes betrayed him. He was annoyed. He was confused. And he was very, very scared.

He could count almost every rib on the boy’s chest; he supposed some things just never changed. There were bruises, too: Angry purplish-black ones that hardly looked a day old, light brown ones that could have been there for months. He pressed his fingers down on one of the newer ones, just below the collar bone, noting the sudden intake in breath from below. Very interesting. Very expected. “How many ribs has he broken so far?”

It was telling that he didn’t even need further explanation. “About three. Perhaps four. It... blends together, sometimes.”

“You’re young.” He moved his other hand from the shoulder-- Jonathan wasn't fighting back anymore, too stunned to do much of anything-- and wrapped it around the boy’s neck. “There will be more.” And then he squeezed. Hard.

The effect was instantaneous: He bucked against him, hands flying to his throat as he tried to fight back once more. Crane leaned more of his body against him-- if he hadn't realized his intentions by then, he was oblivious even by Crane’s standards-- and though the boy had a bit of weight and youth on his side, Crane was much taller and fully focused on the situation, and suppressed his struggles with little difficulty. “St-Stop!” he managed to choke out. “Stop it!”

“Oh, come now; I think we’re both above lying to ourselves, don’t you think?” He chuckled darkly. “I’m simply testing a theory.”

“... Theory?”

“Yes, a theory. One I’ve puzzled over for quite a few years, myself. Hypothesis: There is a very, very thin line between an emotional sadist...” He tightened his grip. “... and a physical masochist.”

Jonathan’s struggles only increased, though not all the noises he made sounded like they were born from pain. However, they all still in vain; Crane only released him when he was close to losing consciousness. Couldn’t be having any of that, after all.

“M... Madman.” He was breathing heavily, face flushed and eyes glossy. “You... I assure you, things will go a lot easier for you if you just let me go now. You have no idea--”

“Oh, really? Don’t I?” His hands now free, he grabbed the half-hard bulge in the front of Jonathan’s trousers none too gently, eliciting a shocked moan. “Where would you go, Jonathan? This isn’t your Gotham, this isn’t your world. Any place you’re thinking of running to right now? Doesn’t exist. The people you’re thinking of reaching out to for help? Don’t know who the hell you are. In fact, the only person in this entire city who definitely won’t think you’re completely delusional... is me. Isn’t that funny? I’d laugh, if I were the type to.” Some of Jonathan’s hair was stuck to his forehead, sticky with sweat. He brushed it away, letting his fingers linger behind a bit. Here was something that was truly beautiful. Something truly beautiful, right at his fingertips, ready to be broken.

He didn’t know what brought him to kiss the boy-- he wasn’t really the kissing type, even during those rare times when he sought intimacy with others-- but he was pleasantly surprised by how... well, pleasant it was. When they parted, hardly a (considerable) nose apart, he could see the surprise in Jonathan’s face as well. He couldn’t tell what kind of surprise it was.

“If you kill me,” he said, his voice a deep rumble in his chest, “you’ll only make whatever tear in time that brought me here grow bigger. You’ll only call attention to yourself.”

“Kill you? I wouldn’t dream of it. How utterly self-involved you must think me.” He smiled to himself as he started to unbutton the boy’s slacks. “And how uncreative.”

So, there they were, with Jonathan in a strange state of semi-undress, his pants around his ankles and his arms caught in his suit jacket and shirt, and Crane still completely dressed, fingering the boy roughly. There was no lube, only a paltry amount of saliva supplied by both men, but Jonathan didn’t seem to mind much. The sweetest thing of all, Crane decided, was watching Jonathan’s precious composure falter and break as his own arousal got the better of him. He even begged wordlessly when Crane removed his fingers to undo his own trousers. Cute.

The boy was tight, and he screamed beautifully when Crane entered him. Though he bled, Crane knew he was not a virgin-- there was no way someone so vain would be able to keep all of that to himself, as he had learned through his interactions with certain other people. Crane was so caught up in his own thoughts, he hadn’t noticed that he was suddenly on the floor.

Wait.

What?

And yet, there he was, flat on his ass on the apartment floor, with Jonathan crouched above him, a crazed sort of smile on his face. “You weren’t going fast enough, old man,” he said in a strange sort of tone, scratchy as burlap, and Crane had the strangest feeling that he wasn’t speaking to a Jonathan anymore. He didn’t have the time to really think about that, as Jonathan had, suddenly as anything, sank down onto Crane’s lap to the hilt. Crane didn’t think about much after that, except how easily the tables had been turned on him. By himself.

When he woke the following morning, he noticed two things: One, that sleeping on the floor had given him the mother of all cricks in his back, which made him feel a bit resentful of the youth of others; and, two, that Jonathan was gone. Vanished. The only evidence that he had ever even been there was a messed-up desk and a few questionable-looking balled-up paper towels on the floor. He lied back down and, despite the pain or because of it, grinned.

Alternate universes. Never a dull moment in Gotham City.

**Author's Note:**

> double cranebow all the way across the sky


End file.
